David Cotton
Biographic Data
| ID | 241756 |
|---|---|
| NAME | David Cotton |
| GIVEN NAMES | David |
| FAMILY NAME | Cotton |
| SIGNATURE | COTTON D |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Plymouth |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7675-8211 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 37 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 75 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 37 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1977 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Undergraduate students’ understanding and willingness to engage in sustainable development: Insights from Chinese higher education
Chatting and cheating: Ensuring academic integrity in the era of ChatGPT
The use of artificial intelligence in academia is a hot topic in the education field. ChatGPT is an AI tool that offers a range of benefits, including increased student engagement, collaboration, and accessibility. However, is also raises concerns regarding academic honesty and plagiarism. This paper examines the opportunities and challenges of using ChatGPT in higher education, and discusses the potential risks and rewards of these tools. The pa…
Embedding interdisciplinary learning into the first-year undergraduate curriculum: Drivers and barriers in a cross-institutional enhancement project
Engaging with interdisciplinary learning during higher education (HE) study can provide students with skills and modes of thinking informed by multiple worldviews. Opportunities for interdisciplinary learning in the English HE system are limited; associated primarily with postgraduate study or later undergraduate stages. This paper reports on an enhancement project that sought to engage first-year students with interdisciplinary learning. Drawing…
Visual images of sustainability in higher education: The hidden curriculum of climate change on campus
Purpose Perceptions of climate change are strongly influenced by visual cues and images. Many universities have made significant steps towards decarbonisation, yet these often remain hidden from the campus community. This study aims to explore the hidden curriculum of climate change on campus and compare participants’ images of sustainability on campus with those on university websites. Design/methodology/approach This research was underpinned by…
Using data science for sustainable development in higher education
Despite the abundance of studies focused on how higher education institutions (HEIs) are implementing sustainable development (SD) in their educational programmes, there is a paucity of interdisciplinary studies exploring the role of technology, such as data science, in an SD context. Further research is thus needed to identify how SD is being deployed in higher education (HE), generating positive externalities for society and the environment. Th…
Student energy-saving in higher education tackling the challenge of decarbonisation
Purpose This study aims to explore students’ sustainability attitudes and behavioural intentions and their relation to energy use, to promote energy saving and decarbonisation in higher education settings. Design/methodology/approach The authors used a validated energy literacy survey to assess undergraduate students’ attitudes and behavioural intentions towards energy saving in two countries (Brazil and Belgium). The questionnaire, administered …
Teaching environmental sustainability in China: Opportunities and challenges for business and economics faculty in higher education
Environmental sustainability constitutes an important part of the political and educational context in China as it strives to move toward an ecological civilization. However, there is limited literature documenting the ways in which sustainability is embedded in higher education (HE) teaching. This qualitative research involves interviews and focus groups with 30 faculty in Business and Economics disciplines at three high-ranked Chinese Universit…
Damage Limitation: Learning Lessons from Complaints and Appeals Staff on the Handling of Student Grievance
Internalising internationalisation: Views of Internationalisation of the Curriculum Among Non-Mobile Home Students
There is considerable literature on internationalising the curriculum in higher education, but relatively little of this focuses on developing international perspectives in home-based students. In particular, there has been limited direct engagement with student views and understandings, especially comparatively across a wide range of subjects. To address this gap, we surveyed 495 first-year students in nine subjects across four faculties at a UK…
The Cinderella of academia: Is higher education pedagogic research undervalued in UK research assessment
Academic research is increasingly driven by research assessment exercises (in the UK, by the Research Excellence Framework, REF). These aim to compare outputs of researchers in each university with those elsewhere, but evaluation efforts have suffered from widespread criticism. The status of pedagogic research in higher education (HE) – once described as the ‘Cinderella’ of academia, but now an increasing part of university research activity – ha…
Is students’ energy literacy related to their university’s position in a sustainability ranking
University rankings are increasingly important internationally, and in the UK include a sustainability ‘Green League’. However, there is little evidence about experiences of studying in ‘sustainable universities’. We report an empirical study at five universities in varied positions in the Green League, exploring students’ energy literacy, environmental attitudes and perceptions of their institution’s energy-saving efforts. Although the link to e…
Pedagogic research in geography higher education
Higher education provision in a crowded marketplace
Current changes to policy around higher education in the United Kingdom are leading to an increasingly marketised system. As funding is transferred from the United Kingdom government to the individual student, universities will be required to pay more attention to marketing. This paper draws on the literature relating to marketing of services to assess the extent to which higher education marketing addresses issues of covenant, quiddity and repre…
Researching communicated geographies: Introduction
Commitment to environmental sustainability in the UK student population
Sustainability is an increasingly important issue in higher education, both in the UK and internationally. Although environmental sustainability is the most frequently identified of the three pillars of sustainability (social and economic sustainability being less widely understood), there has been little previous research which has quantitatively explored the relationship between university attendance and commitment to environmental sustainabili…
Making the hidden curriculum visible: Sustainability literacy in higher education
Despite strong political support for the development of sustainability literacy amongst the UK graduates, embedding sustainability in the higher education curriculum has met with widespread indifference, and in some cases, active resistance. However, opportunities exist beyond the formal curriculum for engaging students in learning about sustainability. Previous research has highlighted the potential of the university campus for experiential, pla…
Researching the hidden curriculum: Intentional and unintended messages
In this paper, we examine the concept of the hidden curriculum, its importance to pedagogic research in geography and research methods which might be used to investigate it. We review three case studies of research projects which have explored the hidden curriculum in geographical contexts, and use these to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of different methods. We conclude by suggesting that there is an increasing need for research explori…
Using Observational Methods to Research the Student Experience
Much pedagogic research undertaken in geography and other disciplines relies on post-hoc methods such as surveys or interviews to investigate the student experience of higher education (often based on self-reports of behaviour). However, observation of students provides a far more direct route to obtain information about their behaviour, and there are many situations where observational data—collected by a researcher or by students themselves usi…
Revolutions and second-best solutions: Education for Sustainable Development in Higher Education
Despite widespread policy support for education for sustainable development in higher education, and a strong academic literature arguing for a radical rethink of curriculum, pedagogy and institutional culture, progress towards the educational reforms advocated remains limited. Based on in‐depth interviews with lecturers at a case‐study university, this article explores reasons for the slow pace of change, in particular how constraining variables…
The rhetoric and reality of e‐learning: Using the think‐aloud method to evaluate an online resource
This paper reports the findings of a small‐scale study that investigated student nurses’ use of an online resource in Biology. The think‐aloud method was used to explore in detail the ways in which students engaged with this resource and to evaluate the ways and extent to which it might enhance their learning. The students generally expressed positive views about the resource, which they used in a variety of ways to supplement more traditional le…
Researching Sustainability in Higher Education: From Local to Global
A scholarly article by authors James Gray-Donald, Debby R. E. Cotton, and Martyn F. Warren, Ian Bailey, Fumiyo Kagawa published in The International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, Economic, and Social Sustainability: Annual Review
Sustainable development, higher education and pedagogy: A study of lecturers' beliefs and attitudes
Education for sustainable development (ESD) is playing an increasing role in the higher education curriculum. However, little previous research exists on lecturers' understanding of and attitudes towards sustainable development. This study used an online questionnaire to investigate lecturers' views of sustainable development and its contribution to the higher education curriculum. The questionnaire asks lecturers from a variety of different disc…
Physical Geography: A Human Perspective by Richard Huggett, Sarah Lindley, Helen Gavin and Kate Richardson
Market Leader: Pre-Intermediate (Course Book)
Processes of Change in the Adoption of Consistent Condom Use
Descriptions of reproductive and sexual behavior were obtained from interviews with a convenience sample of women at risk of HIV infection or transmission to assess whether the processes of change (POC) constructs from the Transtheoretical Model apply to women's explanations of condom behavior change. Participants were recruited from public housing, drug treatment centers, homeless shelters, and other sources. Interviews with 45 women were select…
Sustainable development, higher education and pedagogy: A study of lecturers' beliefs and attitudes
Education for sustainable development (ESD) is playing an increasing role in the higher education curriculum. However, little previous research exists on lecturers' understanding of and attitudes towards sustainable development. This study used an online questionnaire to investigate lecturers' views of sustainable development and its contribution to the higher education curriculum. The questionnaire asks lecturers from a variety of different disc…
Using Observational Methods to Research the Student Experience
Much pedagogic research undertaken in geography and other disciplines relies on post-hoc methods such as surveys or interviews to investigate the student experience of higher education (often based on self-reports of behaviour). However, observation of students provides a far more direct route to obtain information about their behaviour, and there are many situations where observational data—collected by a researcher or by students themselves usi…
Researching the hidden curriculum: Intentional and unintended messages
In this paper, we examine the concept of the hidden curriculum, its importance to pedagogic research in geography and research methods which might be used to investigate it. We review three case studies of research projects which have explored the hidden curriculum in geographical contexts, and use these to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of different methods. We conclude by suggesting that there is an increasing need for research explori…
Revolutions and second-best solutions: Education for Sustainable Development in Higher Education
Despite widespread policy support for education for sustainable development in higher education, and a strong academic literature arguing for a radical rethink of curriculum, pedagogy and institutional culture, progress towards the educational reforms advocated remains limited. Based on in‐depth interviews with lecturers at a case‐study university, this article explores reasons for the slow pace of change, in particular how constraining variables…
Making the hidden curriculum visible: Sustainability literacy in higher education
Despite strong political support for the development of sustainability literacy amongst the UK graduates, embedding sustainability in the higher education curriculum has met with widespread indifference, and in some cases, active resistance. However, opportunities exist beyond the formal curriculum for engaging students in learning about sustainability. Previous research has highlighted the potential of the university campus for experiential, pla…
Internalising internationalisation: Views of Internationalisation of the Curriculum Among Non-Mobile Home Students
There is considerable literature on internationalising the curriculum in higher education, but relatively little of this focuses on developing international perspectives in home-based students. In particular, there has been limited direct engagement with student views and understandings, especially comparatively across a wide range of subjects. To address this gap, we surveyed 495 first-year students in nine subjects across four faculties at a UK…
Processes of Change in the Adoption of Consistent Condom Use
Descriptions of reproductive and sexual behavior were obtained from interviews with a convenience sample of women at risk of HIV infection or transmission to assess whether the processes of change (POC) constructs from the Transtheoretical Model apply to women's explanations of condom behavior change. Participants were recruited from public housing, drug treatment centers, homeless shelters, and other sources. Interviews with 45 women were select…
The Cinderella of academia: Is higher education pedagogic research undervalued in UK research assessment
Academic research is increasingly driven by research assessment exercises (in the UK, by the Research Excellence Framework, REF). These aim to compare outputs of researchers in each university with those elsewhere, but evaluation efforts have suffered from widespread criticism. The status of pedagogic research in higher education (HE) – once described as the ‘Cinderella’ of academia, but now an increasing part of university research activity – ha…
Commitment to environmental sustainability in the UK student population
Sustainability is an increasingly important issue in higher education, both in the UK and internationally. Although environmental sustainability is the most frequently identified of the three pillars of sustainability (social and economic sustainability being less widely understood), there has been little previous research which has quantitatively explored the relationship between university attendance and commitment to environmental sustainabili…
Using data science for sustainable development in higher education
Despite the abundance of studies focused on how higher education institutions (HEIs) are implementing sustainable development (SD) in their educational programmes, there is a paucity of interdisciplinary studies exploring the role of technology, such as data science, in an SD context. Further research is thus needed to identify how SD is being deployed in higher education (HE), generating positive externalities for society and the environment. Th…
Teaching environmental sustainability in China: Opportunities and challenges for business and economics faculty in higher education
Environmental sustainability constitutes an important part of the political and educational context in China as it strives to move toward an ecological civilization. However, there is limited literature documenting the ways in which sustainability is embedded in higher education (HE) teaching. This qualitative research involves interviews and focus groups with 30 faculty in Business and Economics disciplines at three high-ranked Chinese Universit…
Is students’ energy literacy related to their university’s position in a sustainability ranking
University rankings are increasingly important internationally, and in the UK include a sustainability ‘Green League’. However, there is little evidence about experiences of studying in ‘sustainable universities’. We report an empirical study at five universities in varied positions in the Green League, exploring students’ energy literacy, environmental attitudes and perceptions of their institution’s energy-saving efforts. Although the link to e…
Higher education provision in a crowded marketplace
Current changes to policy around higher education in the United Kingdom are leading to an increasingly marketised system. As funding is transferred from the United Kingdom government to the individual student, universities will be required to pay more attention to marketing. This paper draws on the literature relating to marketing of services to assess the extent to which higher education marketing addresses issues of covenant, quiddity and repre…
Researching communicated geographies: Introduction
Factors affecting the accumulation of Dimethoate in soil
The effects of frequency of application, initial soil moisture content, rate of water application and soil organic matter content on the accumulation of dimethoate in different soils have been studied in the laboratory. It was found that: residual accumulation of the pesticide increased with frequency of application (even under leaching conditions) increasing the initial soil moisture content resulted in increased loss by leaching and therefore a…
Factors affecting the fate of dimethoate in soils
For a given application of dimethoate, the loss by leaching increased with soil type in the following order: clay clay loam > sand > S.C.L. > loam. However, the loss due to evaporation alone was in the order; sand > S.C.L. > clay loam > loam. Biological degradation of dimethoate was of little importance
Factors influencing the degradation of dimethoate in soils and solutions
It was found that pH, temperature and the type of medium are important factors affecting the stability of dimethoate in soils and solutions. Evaporation is a minor factor in determining the loss of dimethoate from water. Within the pH range of 7–11, dimethoate degradation depends on the alkalinity of the medium rather than the time of storage. At pH 4.2 degradation is largely dependent on the length of time the dimethoate solution has been stored…
Separation and characterization of dimethoate metabolites developing in soil and alkaline solution
The investigation has shown that the thin‐layer chromatographic technique is efficient in separating mixtures of dimethoate metabolites from soil extracts. Nine metabolites were isolated, six were positively identified as O, desmethyl dimethoate, dimethoate carboxylic acid, dimethyl dithiophosphoric acid, dimethyl thiophosphoric acid, dimethyl phosphoric acid and phosphoric acid. The remaining three were tentatively identified as two isomers of O…
Factors involved in the dynamics of pesticides in soils: The effect of temperature and period of contact on leachability and adsorption of pesticides by soils
The effect of soil temperature on Ieachability and adsorption of pyrolan, γ‐HCH, α‐endosulphan, β‐endosulphan and dieldrin by Gezira soil from the Sudan, was studied. It was found that even when subjected to high temperatures (45°C) and prolonged leaching (60+ days), dieldrin and endosulphan isomers did not leach below 17 cm depth, but pyrolan and γ‐HCH exhibited leaching. In general, the leaching of pyrolan was greater than that of γ‐HCH. With t…
Factors involved in the dynamics of pesticides in soils: The effect of pesticide concentration on leachability and adsorption
The effect of concentration on leachability and adsorption of γ‐HCH, dieldrin, endosulphan and pyrolan was studied in a sandy clay loam from Northern England (Yorkshire region), under laboratory and greenhouse conditions. Concentration did not affect leachability and adsorption of dieldrin and endosulphan, but increased leachability of pyrolan and γ‐HCH, decreased adsorption of pyrolan and had a slight effect on γ‐HCH adsorption. The investigatio…
Pesticide‐microbial interaction in the soil
Soils collected from the Gezira irrigation scheme in Sudan were incubated with five pesticides (pyrolan, α‐and β‐endosulphan, γ‐HCH and dieldrin), using three independent methods (incubation of microbial culture with soil and leachates, with carbon‐based growth media and with carbon‐free mineral salt agar). Endosulphan isomers were degraded by soil micro‐organisms to a much greater extent than pyrolan, dieldrin or γ‐HCH. When applied at low conce…
Persistence of pesticides in soil leachates: Effect of pH ultra‐violet irradiation and temperature
The effects of pH, ultra‐violet irradiation and temperature on the persistence and breakdown of dieldrin, endosulphan, gamma‐HCH and pyrolan were studied in leachates from a loam soil. Except for dieldrin which remained exceptionally stable throughout the pH range, persistence of pesticides decreased progressively as pH increased. After exposure to ultra‐violet irradiation of 2537°A wavelength, dieldrin was appreciably broken down in activated ch…
Using Case Studies for Business English
CDC behavioral interventions
CDC behavioral interventions
Processes of Change in the Adoption of Consistent Condom Use
Descriptions of reproductive and sexual behavior were obtained from interviews with a convenience sample of women at risk of HIV infection or transmission to assess whether the processes of change (POC) constructs from the Transtheoretical Model apply to women's explanations of condom behavior change. Participants were recruited from public housing, drug treatment centers, homeless shelters, and other sources. Interviews with 45 women were select…
Determinants of Safer Sexual Behavior in a Long-term HIV-seropositive Population: The Multisite Hemophilia Behavior Intervention Evaluation Project (HBIEP)
Determinants of safer sexual behaviors among HIV-infected adult men with hemophilia were examined. A model was proposed that personal adjustment, communication skills, self-efficacy, and perceived advantages of condom use would influence safer sex practices. The model was tested with 181 men with hemophilia and HIV infection from 27 hemophilia treatment centers across the United States. The hypothesized model was tested using LISREL and explained…
Market Leader: Pre-Intermediate (Course Book)
Physical Geography: A Human Perspective by Richard Huggett, Sarah Lindley, Helen Gavin and Kate Richardson
The rhetoric and reality of e‐learning: Using the think‐aloud method to evaluate an online resource
This paper reports the findings of a small‐scale study that investigated student nurses’ use of an online resource in Biology. The think‐aloud method was used to explore in detail the ways in which students engaged with this resource and to evaluate the ways and extent to which it might enhance their learning. The students generally expressed positive views about the resource, which they used in a variety of ways to supplement more traditional le…
Researching Sustainability in Higher Education: From Local to Global
A scholarly article by authors James Gray-Donald, Debby R. E. Cotton, and Martyn F. Warren, Ian Bailey, Fumiyo Kagawa published in The International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, Economic, and Social Sustainability: Annual Review
Sustainable development, higher education and pedagogy: A study of lecturers' beliefs and attitudes
Education for sustainable development (ESD) is playing an increasing role in the higher education curriculum. However, little previous research exists on lecturers' understanding of and attitudes towards sustainable development. This study used an online questionnaire to investigate lecturers' views of sustainable development and its contribution to the higher education curriculum. The questionnaire asks lecturers from a variety of different disc…
Revolutions and second-best solutions: Education for Sustainable Development in Higher Education
Despite widespread policy support for education for sustainable development in higher education, and a strong academic literature arguing for a radical rethink of curriculum, pedagogy and institutional culture, progress towards the educational reforms advocated remains limited. Based on in‐depth interviews with lecturers at a case‐study university, this article explores reasons for the slow pace of change, in particular how constraining variables…
Using Observational Methods to Research the Student Experience
Much pedagogic research undertaken in geography and other disciplines relies on post-hoc methods such as surveys or interviews to investigate the student experience of higher education (often based on self-reports of behaviour). However, observation of students provides a far more direct route to obtain information about their behaviour, and there are many situations where observational data—collected by a researcher or by students themselves usi…
Making the hidden curriculum visible: Sustainability literacy in higher education
Despite strong political support for the development of sustainability literacy amongst the UK graduates, embedding sustainability in the higher education curriculum has met with widespread indifference, and in some cases, active resistance. However, opportunities exist beyond the formal curriculum for engaging students in learning about sustainability. Previous research has highlighted the potential of the university campus for experiential, pla…
Researching the hidden curriculum: Intentional and unintended messages
In this paper, we examine the concept of the hidden curriculum, its importance to pedagogic research in geography and research methods which might be used to investigate it. We review three case studies of research projects which have explored the hidden curriculum in geographical contexts, and use these to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of different methods. We conclude by suggesting that there is an increasing need for research explori…
Higher education provision in a crowded marketplace
Current changes to policy around higher education in the United Kingdom are leading to an increasingly marketised system. As funding is transferred from the United Kingdom government to the individual student, universities will be required to pay more attention to marketing. This paper draws on the literature relating to marketing of services to assess the extent to which higher education marketing addresses issues of covenant, quiddity and repre…
Researching communicated geographies: Introduction
Commitment to environmental sustainability in the UK student population
Sustainability is an increasingly important issue in higher education, both in the UK and internationally. Although environmental sustainability is the most frequently identified of the three pillars of sustainability (social and economic sustainability being less widely understood), there has been little previous research which has quantitatively explored the relationship between university attendance and commitment to environmental sustainabili…
Psychology (20 works) · Sociology (20 works) · Pedagogy (17 works) · Higher education (16 works) · Political science (16 works) · Curriculum (10 works) · Environmental Education and Sustainability (10 works) · Sustainability in Higher Education (10 works) · Public relations (9 works) · Agronomy (8 works)